WHAT A WAYWARD LORD NEEDS, page 29
part #2 of LORDS OF HAPPENSTANCE Series
Edward snorted. “Good for me.” He glanced across Bentley to Donald. “We’re about to live like kings, my friend.”
“Indeed.” Donald lifted his cup in tribute and they both took a hearty mouthful.
Her stepson narrowed his eyes. “Why do you not drink, Stepmother?”
“Waiting for you.” Bastard. She lifted the untainted cup and took a sip. The liquid was welcome to her parched throat, if nothing else, but swallowing as she waited for the two poisons to take affect was nearly beyond her.
It took only seconds for the respective poisons to do their jobs. Donald fell victim first. He dropped his cup and clutched a hand to his chest. “My pulse is racing.” Shivers wracked his body and then he slipped from the throne to the stone dais, his body stiffening with muscular paralysis. The pistol tumbled from his lax hand.
“You poisoned us!” Dawning knowledge crept into Edward’s voice. “Bitch.” He tossed his cup away, vaulting from his throne, his movements slow.
“Yes.” She glanced at Donald. The young man was already well on his way to dying. Shouldn’t be long now. “Young Lord Paddington must have received the Death Orchid poison.”
“What did you give me?” Edward staggered toward her as Bentley struggled to his feet.
“Capital plan, Cora,” he exclaimed, and she briefly warmed with his praise, but she didn’t take her gaze from her stepson.
“You have received poison from the dart tree frog. Soon your tongue will swell, the soft tissues of your throat too. Some muscle paralysis will set in.” She marveled at the coolness of her voice, but inside, she died a thousand deaths for using her knowledge to kill. “You might survive it, depending on how much you swallowed, but by then, Bentley and I will be long gone from here.”
“Not if I can help it.” Despite his ponderous movements, Edward sprang at her. He yanked the untouched tin cup from her hand, plowed into Bentley, knocking him backward onto the throne. “Perhaps I’ll leave you to die of starvation and dehydration, for your lover will perish right now.” He jumped onto the chair with the king’s agent, straddling him, forcing his mouth open, but Bentley bit his fingers. Edward splashed a measure of the liquid into the agent’s face. Bentley cried out. Did the poison sting his eyes? She’d never had cause to research it before, but it might, since it affected soft tissue.
“Bentley…” Before Cora could assist, her stepson poured the remainder of the tea into Bentley’s mouth. He smashed the agent’s jaws together to prevent him from spitting out the tea.
“See you in hell, Lord Castlereagh.” With a cry that she could only interpret as frustration, Edward slid off Bentley’s lap. He stumbled on unsteady legs, heading to the stairs, while Bentley writhed on the throne, his hands tied, his legs twitching.
Her heart squeezed. I’m so, so sorry. She’d tend to him as soon as she neutralized Edward. When she looked again at her stepson, he’d gained the first landing. “I meant what I said, Edward,” she said in a steady voice as she removed the dagger from the inside of her boot, holding it by the blade, the metal cool on her fingers. “You won’t leave this cavern alive.” Then, after a deep breath, she took aim and threw the weapon.
As it arced, the silver blade reflected the firelight. The blade buried itself in the middle of Edward’s back and he fell upon a pile of treasure, unmoving.
Still holding on to her cup of tea, Cora rushed to the altar stone. She grabbed her pack and moved to Bentley’s location. He’d fallen to the floor next to the dead body of Donald. “Hang on,” she whispered, and laid her cup and pack on the floor beside him. “I did what I had to do.” After turning him over, she untied the cravat from his wrists. “Trust me that it will come out as it should.”
He didn’t answer with words. Grunts escaped him. His lips tried to form words, but nothing escaped into the air, and he watched her with wide eyes, clouded with fear.
“I’m sorry.” She sat upon the floor, her legs crossed, and tugged his upper body into her lap with his head resting against her belly. “This will be extremely unpleasant, but it’s necessary.” Cora encouraged him to turn to the side, and with a quick prayer, she pried open his mouth and stuck a couple of fingers down his throat. He fought her as best he could, but he was weak and somewhat paralyzed and she easily kept her stance. “No time for a stiff upper lip, Bentley. I need you to vomit.” She moved her fingers deeper.
His body shuddered. Sweat broke out on his forehead to blend with the trickle of blood oozing from the ghastly wound on his forehead and temple. Every muscle in his body went taut, but he retched, and she barely had time to remove her hand. Thankfully, he hadn’t eaten much, but it was a disgusting endeavor anyway, and not the sort of intimacy any couple should have to share.
“Hopefully you expelled some of the poison.” She patted his head as he flopped back into her lap. Then she retrieved her pack, and propping it upon his chest, she dug inside for the small packet of charred, burned bits of ground wood. She poured them into the remains of her tea cup, swished the contents about with her finger and then held the cup to his lips with a shaking hand. “Please, you must swallow as much of this as you can. The charred wood will absorb any remaining poison.” She’d not field tested the concoction, but had only practiced it in theory.
To his credit, Bentley gulped down the whole contents of the cup. With a sound she couldn’t interpret, he lay heavily in her lap, his breath ragged and shallow, his eyes closed, and every once in a while, he’d give into a shiver or dry heave.
Her mind spun with all possible scenarios. She had no idea what would happen, but she would remain with him until the last. She stroked her grimy fingers through his hair, reveling in its softness against her skin. “Be strong. I cannot lose you, not like this.” Gently, she held him, rocking him while his limbs lay sprawled, and she prayed he’d pull through.
Was her gambit in vain?
Eventually, his shaking subsided. His sweating stopped. Soon after, the agent’s breathing normalized. While she monitored him for further positive signs, his eyes fluttered open and he stared up at her with that slightly crooked, maddening grin that flashed his dimple.
“Do you see the affect you have on me?” he asked in a rasping, scratchy voice. “I’ve come back from the grip of death for you.”
“Oh, Bentley.” Though she rolled her eyes, her heart swelled with love and gratitude. She shook her head as tears filled her eyes. “You weren’t dying.” I think, but it was difficult to know after ingesting so much of that poison.
“Allow me this moment of dramatics after you unceremoniously violated me.” He lifted a hand, gently pulling on her braid until she came over him, and then he touched his lips to hers. The muscles in her stomach clenched with the worry there might be trace amounts of poison transferred during contact, but then she relaxed. This, like life, was an exercise in luck. Yet, she still prayed. Please, God, let his vomiting and the water washed all harm away.
Once the kiss ended, she said, “Don’t pretend like you didn’t purposefully hold back from neutralizing those boys. You could have taken them both out with tied hands.”
He grunted. “Perhaps, but I wanted you to have the honor of sorting Edward yourself. You deserve all the credit, my dear.”
Was there any man like Bentley, a man who’d proved time out of hand that he was different? The tears spilled from her cheeks to splatter upon his when she broke the embrace. “Let’s leave this horrible place.” Gold was valuable and coveted, of course, but nothing could take the place of her agent, grinning and joking once more.
“Agreed.”
Before either of them could move, Edward staggered up the steps toward them.
“You will die here,” he gasped out, his eyes wild, his expression filled with rage and hate. Blood stained his waistcoat and trickled from his mouth.
“I’ve grown rather tired of this Drury Lane production.” Bentley scrabbled on the stone floor, and when his fingers glanced over Donald’s dropped pistol, he grasped it, pointed it at Edward as the young man cleared the dais. And then he fired. The gunshot echoed for seemingly endless seconds throughout the cavern.
Edward staggered, his lips forming an “O” of surprise. He placed a hand over his heart where a hole had ripped through his chest, and with an unintelligible sound, he fell backward, his body rolling down the stairs until it finally came to a permanent rest on the landing.
“It’s over,” Cora breathed, and she gave into a shudder. This had been one night she’d rather forget. “But at what cost?”
“Everything has a cost, love,” Bentley whispered as he slowly gained his feet. “You did what you needed to do, and I continue to marvel over that seamless plan.”
She rose and retrieved her pack, easily slipping it onto her shoulders. At the last second, she spared a glance at Donald. Poor thing. “At least my research came in handy.”
“There’s that, but if I can make one request?” he asked as he helped her down the stairs and he leaned against her.
“What?”
“Never give me tea laced with poison again, no matter how angry you get with me. That is one experience I do not wish to repeat.” He laughed, but it was a rusty sound.
To her ears it was the most joyous music she’d ever heard. Tears welled in her eyes again. “I promise.”
Once they’d retrieved Bentley’s pack and pistol, stowed away a few trinkets and coins, they made their way out of the cavern of death through the direction the boys had come from. Two corridors later, they emerged, blinking into the moonlight. And with Bentley’s last step out, there was the unmistakable click of yet another pressure plate as it activated.
“Shit!” The king’s agent glanced at her. “You know what that means.”
“Yes.” No doubt Michael had been more careful or else he’d known of the location of such traps, for he probably hadn’t hurried like they did now.
“Run!”
Immediately, the earth rumbled and shifted as another earthquake gripped the area. She clung to Bentley as they fought to stay upright, but when it became clear the tremors didn’t belong to a natural phenomenon, he urged her into a run. They pelted away from the collapsing Inca pyramid as a huge hole in the ground opened to swallow it. Dust and dirt blanketed the area; the sound deafening. No sooner had she and her agent cleared the ancient ruins of what used to be a walkway, the remainder of the ruins disappeared from view.
“How utterly… sad,” Cora remarked as they stood, peering through the dust cloud where the great city of El Dorado used to stand. “We’ll never know how big the city was or see all the wonders it probably contained.” No doubt this was a grand trap laid in place by the original inhabitants.
He slid an arm about her waist and held her close. Beneath her ear, his heartbeat pounded as fast as hers. “Perhaps we were never meant to. This way, the gods or the earth has reclaimed it, and perhaps that’s as it should be.” He shrugged. “Who can say? A hundred years or so from now, some other explorers might find El Dorado. I wish them luck. It is quite a challenge.”
She grimaced. “In some ways I hope the city is never found. A place like this deserves to languish in obscurity.”
“My sentiments exactly.”
They walked away from the scene of destruction, and past a grouping of fallen stones, they found Mr. Gibbs waiting with Manuel and a handful of white alpacas.
Bentley laughed, which tugged a smile from her. It was good to feel happy again. “Gibbs, you old dog! You could have come to help us.”
The valet and Manuel grinned. Relief showed in their expressions. “Manuel and I figured you had it handled, my lord.”
He snorted. “I almost died.”
Cora shoved at Bentley’s shoulder. “You did not.”
“It is good to see you both more or less alive.” Gibbs laughed as he enveloped them in his gaze. “From the looks of you, it seems trouble has followed the whole of your trip… Bentley.”
“That is has.” He sighed. He and the valet exchanged amused grins, but Cora didn’t know why. “How about we see about leaving the jungle?”
“You won’t find a protest with me.” Gibbs led them to the waiting alpacas who had lanterns bobbing merrily about their necks. “No doubt we’ll find a village nearby and can go from there.”
Cora buried her face in one of the animal’s necks as the men talked. What the devil am I to do now? Surreptitiously, she cast a glance about the area, but since they’d exited the hillside well away from where they’d gone in, there was no sign of the Death Orchids. A shuddering sigh escaped her. Perhaps it was best to let the pursuit of them go. Once every trace of her research was destroyed, no one would know what she’d discovered. They were no longer her priority, for there were other, more valuable things destined for her future.
The Death Orchids could easily look after themselves.
Chapter Twenty-four
Day Sixty-six
November 9, 1822
Saturday
We have been on the journey back up the Orinoco for three days.
I apologize for not keeping better records since I last wrote, but life grew suddenly complicated, and then it turned deadly.
However, the murder of Lord Paddington has been solved. The son of Lord Trammel admitted to the killing at the same time he and Lord Paddington’s son confessed to the plan of raping El Dorado of its treasures and bringing them back to London for their own gain. That never occurred, for both men met an early demise in said city. Lady Trammel and I were barely able to make our escape before the earth reclaimed El Dorado. As of now, it is once more lost, and it’s my fondest wish that it remains hidden. No doubt there was more than one trigger plate embedded in the ground that would ensure the pyramid’s collapse. Is it still intact? I would like to think so, for it didn’t blow apart, only sank. Perhaps future generations will come upon the wonder that is El Dorado, but for their sakes, I hope they come more prepared than I did. My one regret is that I didn’t have time to see the full city and all the treasures it contained. It must have been an amazing place in its prime. For now, we shall all continue to imagine. Perhaps that’s for the best.
Other details of this mission I’ll share in my report once I arrive home. I’d rather not have to write them out at the moment, for some of them were unpleasant. The others I’m trying to wrap my head around, even days later.
Once we cleared the temple, we accompanied alpacas—personal note here: I do not care for such beasts. They spit, and they took immediate exception to me. Not wishing to stop and make camp for the night since our supplies were nonexistent, we continued on. Shortly after dawn, we reached a village, some ten miles away from the Columbian-Venezuelan border—who knew we were so close to a human settlement this whole time—and when we offered a gold coin and said alpacas in trade, the natives gladly shared food, water, supplies, and two canoes. It’s an extremely poor region, and it near broke my heart, but they can do good with that coin.
After a brief rest and a meal, we set off on a tributary that led to the Orinoco.
Now, the journey rankles, for there are words I need to say to Lady Trammel—Cora. Words I cannot in all honesty keep to myself any longer. I have an impossible task ahead of me, for she doesn’t return my regard, but say those words I must, if only to have had the chance to tell a woman the contents of my heart and to unburden my soul. If I don’t, I will always wonder, and that’s a terrible prospect.
Wish me luck, Elton. I have no idea what will occur when next I sit down to write.
Bentley stared at the sun as it sparkled on the water of the Orinoco. It would be at least three or four weeks before they reached Ciudad Bolivar, but he couldn’t remain silent for that long, nor could he act as if nothing had occurred between him and Cora. Since they’d left the Inca pyramid, he and Cora hadn’t spent time alone. Neither had they spoken of anything personal. On the rare occasions when their gazes had met, hers roiled with questions and sadness and a certain wistfulness he desperately wished to explore. But there hadn’t been an opportunity.
Mayhap I should force the issue and make the time now… but what if she soundly rejects me?
He looked at Gibbs, who’d taken over the task of rowing. The valet quirked an eyebrow, nodded toward the other canoe not four feet away and widened his eyes. Clearly, his friend wanted him to make a move.
“Understood,” Bentley whispered and tried to screw his courage to the sticking point. Why was it that he could cheerfully agree to a mission, but when it came to talking to the woman who’d set his world on fire, he felt as vulnerable as a green youth, complete with shaking knees?
Then he cast his gaze to Cora, who sat with her back in the forward position while Manuel rowed. She must have felt his regard, for she glanced up and a tentative smile curved her kissable lips before customary uncertainty snatched it away. His heart squeezed, and he knew a powerful urge to have the right to cajole her into a better humor for the rest of their lives.
None of that would happen if he kept sitting like a lump.
Gibbs cleared his throat. “I’ve grown rather fond of the quiet of the midday here in the jungle. Lends itself well to conversation, wouldn’t you say, my lord?” Once more he widened his eyes as he stared at Bentley.
“Indubitably.” He peered again at Cora, who looked at him with interest mixed with dread. From the opposite end of her canoe, Manuel grinned and nodded with his usual enthusiasm. “Lady Trammel—Cora—when I first traveled down the river, I hated every moment of the trip. This life was so vastly different than anything I’d known before, I didn’t think I could survive.”
